Gingrich invested in renewables

Newt Gingrich doesn’t just talk about technology and renewable energy on the presidential campaign trail — that’s where he invests his money too.

Of the former House speaker’s personal portfolio, as much as $400,000, spread over 36 companies, is in shares of renewable energy and other high tech companies, ranging from biofuels to cloud computing.

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Details of his portfolio were released as part of his Federal Election Commission personal financial disclosure. Originally due June 10, the form was filed Monday after Gingrich was granted a 45-day extension.

Most of Gingrich’s investments were valued at less than $15,000 each. These include independent investments at big-name firms like AT&T, Hewlett Packard, the defense contracting behemoth Raytheon and the education software company Blackboard.

But through a fund run by the Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Gingrich has invested in a handful of energy companies like solar power firm BrightSource Energy, biochemicals and biofuel researcher Synthetic Geonomics, and renewable energy storage company Deeya Energy. The fund has also helped him buy stock in web ventures such as Meebo, an instant messaging platform, and SugarSync, which specializes in cloud computing.

Gingrich has also made several smaller investments in 10 of those companies, such as Tesla, a high-end electric car company, and Cast TV, a search engine for online videos.

Gingrich has aggressively supported expansion of renewable energy, defending ethanol subsidies as a way of getting the country on a path towards energy independence. He’s proposed ending the ban on oil shale development, lifting legal obstacles to domestic drilling and financing cleaner energy research with oil and gas royalties.

And he’s tried to make technology an integral part of his campaign strategy, becoming the first 2012 candidate to use a Google+ video chat room for a “hangout” conversation with voters, and keeping up his own Twitter feed, which is up to 1.3 million followers.

In 2010, Gingrich’s assets were valued between $7.3 million and $30.7 million. The wide range comes from a multi-million dollar “promissory note” from Gingrich Group to Gingrich Productions, two companies of Gingrich’s vast for-profit and non-profit world.

He reported between $565,000 to $1.15 million in liabilities, which included a interest-free credit line at Tiffany & Co. of up to $1 million, which is now closed. A rough calculation puts the former House speaker’s net worth between $6.7 million and $30.1 million.

The Gingrich family’s assets have grown considerably in recent years. In a 2006 disclosure filed by his wife Callista, the couple reported between roughly $1 million and $2.5 million in assets.

In that 2006 filing, the Basilica of the National Shrine in Washington paid Callista a $5,245 salary for singing in the church choir. While Callista continues to sing at the Catholic church, the FEC did not require her to report an exact dollar figure in the 2010 filing.

Monday’s filing also revealed that Gingrich does not receive a salary from Gingrich Productions, a company dedicated to Gingrich’s films, books, speeches. Instead, the company paid Gingrich more than $2.4 million in dividends in 2010.

Gingrich also owns shares in the Florida talent agency owned by his daughter Kathy Lubbers, which paid him $72,274 last year.

Gingrich also collected between $5,001 and $15,000, in rent from a house in Whitehall, Wis. Gingrich has said that the house — located his wife Callista’s hometown — is his only source of debt today. It is worth between $50,001 and $100,000.